Falling Asleep under the Stars on a Hot Summer Night   The woods whisper the music of the night — crickets, tree frogs, the last stirrings of birds, a faint buzz that might be the fridge or might   be a bug, the steady dripping of her air-conditioner, a mysterious hum — and then the last of all my daytime words   dissolve into darkness that sparkles with summer — fireflies prowling the forest for love, and forty thousand feet up, airplanes come   and go, faintly roaring, and high above those planes, a leisurely progress of satellites inches past stars that are trillions of   miles away, and beyond the mathematics of deep space, beyond the reach of light, there’s only God knows what, and beyond that                                                               for Marti   © Michael Fleming Brattleboro, Vermont July 2025